After the Storm
by HauntedSilver
Summary: Takes place after Siege and Storm. "Genya is laughing, her arms tight around me. 'I did it, Alina! I did it.'" Genya finds a way to recover.


**A/N: I've been meaning to write this since I finished Siege and Storm (because Genya angst pains me), but it only just hit me now how close Ruin and Rising is, and that I need this out before because I'm certain it won't happen because Leigh loves causing me pain.**

**Needless to say, I wrote this in less than a day.**

* * *

"Alina!"

I turn, haltingly, feeling Mal tense up beside me in the darkness of the tunnels. No one calls me Alina anymore (except for him) it's always Sankta Alina, or the Sun Saint.

Genya is standing in front of me, David slightly behind her. I focus on him first -as always- because Genya still hurts to look at. His eyes are lost in their usual pensive look; but there's also that protective edge he's adopted because of her.

My gaze shifts to Genya, cringingly. I brace myself for the raised black ridges that will never heal, the ruined eye.

But.

Her remaining eye gleams gold -the brightest light in the tunnels by far. She looked...happy. Elated, even.

I take a breath, moving my focus to the rest of her face. Her mouth is twisted up in a smile. I start. I haven't seen her smile in weeks. The last time I recall seeing her grin was at the Little Palace: in the days of dinners together in my room, sneaking into the Queen's closet to try on dresses, talking about David and Mal as if boys were more important than war.

Regaining my focus, I look at her other eye -the one adorned in bites- wincing in anticipation. The scars paint themselves in my mind anyway: raised black flesh and hints of red.

Except there are none.

Her ruined eye glows as brightly and beautifully as the other, as perfect as the day I first met her. The other bites on her face have disappeared, skin smoothing out into the flawless alabaster I remember. Awed, my eyes move to her hands. They're still covered in raised black skin, but the bite I remember being square on the back of her right hand is gone.

"You...?" My voice dies out before I can form the words.

I raise my eyes back to Genya's face. She's grinning, eyes alight. David, standing just over her shoulder, is smiling too -happy simply because she is.

"I fixed it, Alina," she breathes. "I fixed it."

I swallow. The bite on my shoulder throbs, like it knows that someone has the power to make it go away. Someone has the power to destroy the power it has over me.

I take a step towards her, entranced. David jerks forward, protectively, without thinking about it, before his brain catches up to his body and he remembers that I'd never hurt her.

Genya exhales, her perfect lips falling as she concentrates. She reaches towards me. I pull my kefta so my shoulder is exposed. Genya's elegant fingers graze the bite, cold on my skin. I pull in a breath, squeezing my eyes shut. There's a slight tingling in my shoulder and when I open my eyes, the bite is gone.

"Genya," I breathe. I grab my shoulder, fingers searching for the raised marks I'm used to. Smooth skin greets me, as mundane as it has always been.

Her eyes are sparkling.

"Genya!" I yank her in for a hug. David flinches.

Genya is laughing, her arms tight around me. "I did it, Alina! I did it."

I let her go, holding her arms tight in mine. "You did it, Genya."

She smiles, nodding enthusiastically, eyes still gleaming. "I can be beautiful again."

I manage a watery smile. _You always were_, I want to say, but I can't. Her face is smudged in dirt but the scars are gone. I see the woman I met in the Little Palace: the vain, tyrannical redhead who never let anyone talk her down. The flawless creature who held her head high through every hardship she faced. My friend, who talked to me when no one else would and could make me smile with a few words. The girl who made me believe I was beautiful too.

I hug her again. "You are beautiful, Genya. You're the most beautiful person I've ever met."

She laughs again, pulling back. "Too bad there aren't any mirrors in this dump." She stares at the tunnel walls in disdain. David opens his mouth, then looks away.

"How..." I touch my shoulder again. "How did you figure it out?" It seems impossible, dreamlike, and I'm terrified of waking up.

Genya smiles, touching one of the bites on her hands. I watch as the black colouring dissolves, smoothing into the same unblemished alabaster as her unmarked skin. "I couldn't sleep last night because..." David moves forward instantaneously as she trails off, hesitantly taking her hand in his. Genya takes a breath. "I couldn't sleep, and I just stared at the bites. I touched the one on my hand and wished, and when I opened my eyes it was gone." She wriggles the fingers on her right hand, watching the skin move -unmarred by the bite that used to be there. "So I woke up David, and I tried my face, to make sure, and after those were gone, I knew I had to find you."

My heart squeezes because she came to me, to heal my one bite before she finished fixing herself. "Thank you, Genya." I say, letting my voice tell her how grateful I really am, how free I feel without the bite of the _nichevo'ya. _

She smiles, because she understands.

I watch her heal her hands, thinking about the bites on her shoulders and back and legs that make her walk so slowly. I watch her put herself back together while David hovers nearby, the protective look stark in his eyes. I watch Mal hover near me, pretending he isn't.

I stare at the pilgrims, and the remaining Grisha. The Grisha of the Little Palace still hudddle together, but they're talking, and I think I see Nadia smile.

We are healing. I didn't think it was possible. I was certain of eternal darkness and despair, of ugly raised bites and pain as a reminder. But we're healing. I'm healing. My bite is gone.

And soon, I will rise.


End file.
